


Many Things Were Like Sleep

by someinstant



Category: DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-02
Updated: 2010-01-02
Packaged: 2017-10-05 15:32:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someinstant/pseuds/someinstant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because no one or nothing can quit once a body gets wind of an eden.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Many Things Were Like Sleep

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: The flaws and words are mine, the universe and characters aren't.

If Tim were to make a list of the things he missed-- not that he would, and never on anything as permanent as paper-- the mask would come first.

Then the bike, and the cape, and the wide assortment of seriously explosive weaponry. The list-- the one he doesn't have-- is all about equipment. There are other things he misses, but that's not--

The mask is the first thing.

He can *feel* it, its cool polymer surface not across the bridge of his nose, the lenses not overlaying his eyes. He shouldn't feel so open, so raw without it-- not when he's lying in his bed, in his t-shirt and boxers. He shouldn't be missing the stupid mask *here*.

Tim bites his lip, and turns onto his side. It's stifling in the dark room, and the sheets twist around his legs in an ineffective pin.

It's not really about the here, though. It's just… it's *time* for the mask, and his face knows it. The same way the skin on the inside of his wrists knows to clamor about vulnerability. The same way he knows other things. Like how the soft tread in the hallway means he's not forgiven yet, and how much a secret can cost.

Tim shuts his eyes and breathes slow and deep. The door opens silently on well-oiled hinges and the footfalls stop just inside the entryway. It's Dana's turn for bed-check, which means she'll stay for a few moments, sigh, and retreat down the hall for the night.

When it's Tim's father, there are usually three or four return trips.

This time, however, Dana doesn't leave as quickly as usual. The heat must strike her as well, or maybe she notices the way Tim's kicked off everything but the sheet. She crosses the floor quietly, stepping over a pile of strategically normal teenage detritus, and opens the window.

Tim wonders what would happen if, one of these nights, he didn't pretend to be asleep. If he just sat on the edge of the bed until they came in, and explained nicely that, no, nothing was wrong-- just that, after several years of disrupted sleep patterns, it was a little hard to get used to an eleven o'clock bedtime on school nights.

He concentrates on his breathing, and waits for the door to close.

The open window helps, a little. He's glad Dana opened it for him, because he had been afraid that if *he* opened it-- If he walked over and looked out--

There's almost a breeze. It's thick, and sticky with humidity, but it feels cool against the bare skin of his arm. Tim rolls onto his back and kicks the sheet the rest of the way off. It rained this afternoon, and he can smell ozone, and damp earth. Something green from the garden. Car exhaust.

He keeps his eyes closed and listens, laying still. It's a good way to ignore the too-light feeling around his eyes. He can hear cicadas, and the faint call of a few optimistic frogs. Traffic is a white-noise hum behind it all, and Tim breathes quiet and deep, imagining the reassuring rock of train-cars.

He's not asleep when he hears it, and he never is. Tim is fairly certain that he's not supposed to be asleep for this, as a motorcycle comes to life several blocks away.

He misses the mask, yes. But there are also other things.

*

During a physics lecture on sound waves the next day, Tim idly attempts to figure out how far away Dick had been last night. At least two blocks east, he determines, but probably closer to three.

He's been out for over a month, now. Closer to two, and he hasn't seen anyone since he left. Not Bruce, not Dick, not Steph. He hasn't *tried* to, because--

Well. He promised his father. But more-- because this *isn't* the first time he'd thought of quitting. Robin-- *being* Robin-- isn't a career. It's something he's good at, the way some people are good at piano sonatas and building card houses or Latin declensions. But it's not everything. He thinks, at least. Maybe.

Being Robin is more like a guarantee for post-traumatic stress syndrome, as far as he can figure.

And in some ways, quitting has been-- liberating. He read a book yesterday. Not on weaponry, not on criminology, not for school, not on computers…. He read a *book*. Granted, it was a mystery. And he was bored the whole damn time. But still.

He's finding that there are all these *things* that people do to not think. And that's good, because if he *thought* for too long about how much like a paper lantern this Tim-suit feels-- thin and glowing and one good pull away from ripping in half-- he might have to admit that he misses--

He *misses*, goddammit.

He's worked on his social life. He still doesn't *have* one, but Bernard's working on that. And--

Speak of the devil in Gucci sunglasses.

"Brooding went out with grunge and flannel, Drake," Bernard drawls, and slides next to him at the lunch table. "I'll report you to the proper Aaron Spelling drama if necessary."

Tim tries a small smile and finds that it's not too bad. "That obvious?" he asks.

"Any more so and there would have been swelling theme music and a lonely spotlight." Bernard picks up his fork and contemplates his tray, frowning. "This look edible to you?" he asks, prodding a lump of something tan and gelatinous.

"I think it's-- Wait, no, it's definitely not." The fork prods the lump again, provoking a delayed ripple. Tim shakes his head. "It's not worth risking botulism, Bernard. I vote vending machine."

"Or you could just give me half of your sandwich."

Tim raises his eyebrow. "And why would I do that?"

"Because I want it," Bernard offers simply. "And because I'll buy you something at the coffee shop later to make up for it." His hand is inching towards the sandwich. "C'mon, Drake," he leers, "I'll make it worth your while."

Tim grins and shoves Bernard's shoulder, and hands the half sandwich over with an exasperated, "*Here*, take it."

He's not, actually, being dense. Bernard *does* want the sandwich. And he will, Tim is sure, offer to pay for coffee sometime this week. He is also sure that Bernard would like to make it worth his while.

Tim isn't used to dealing with this much honesty, however feebly veiled. But it's a good working model.

*

After school, Bernard suggests they go to the coffee shop, so he can repay Tim for the sandwich.

Tim shrugs his bag onto his shoulders. "You don't have to do that, Bernard."

"Believe me, I know," Bernard answers. "I can't imagine why I'm offering to, given that you'll provide the conversation of, say, an especially recalcitrant boulder." Tim snorts, and Bernard grabs his wrist and starts to pull him down the sidewalk. "I must have some sort of martyr complex to put up with you," Bernard continues. "The brooding, the weird sense of humor, the complete *lack* of style…."

It would be easy enough to just *go*, to let Bernard's chattering momentum carry them down the street, and just not think for an hour or so. It would be so easy to explain (or lie-- whatever he's calling it today): he could tell them he forgot, or that it was just a cup of coffee, and that he'd didn't think they'd mind him hanging out with the *one* friend he still has--

Tim tugs against the hold on his wrist, and interrupts Bernard's one-sided conversation. "I can't, Bernard," he apologizes. "I'm sorry. It's-- I'm still on restriction." He really *is* sorry, and wishes he knew a better way to make the words say that.

Bernard runs a hand through his hair. "Jesus, Drake. Still? What did you *do*, man, hoist the crown jewels? Single-handedly raze a major metropolitan area?" Bernard narrows his gaze. "Although I don't think that would surprise me, for some reason," he says slowly.

Tim feels a corner of his mouth edge upwards. Bernard's not half bad. "I'm sorry, man. Maybe later this week." He starts to walk off towards the bus stop at the corner.

"Tim--" He hears Bernard jog a few steps to catch up with him. "Look. Call and *ask* them, at least," he says as he hands Tim something small and plastic.

Tim looks at the object in his hand. "What is this, a piece of a Lego set?"

"Cell phone, idiot. Genius bit of technology which allows for instant communication. Now *call*."

He does, and the conversation goes pretty much the way he thought it would. I'm-sorry-Tim-but, and You-know-the-rules, and Maybe-some-other-time. Bernard watches Tim's face steadily during his conversation with Dana, hands shoved into his pockets.

"No dice?" he asks as Tim hangs up.

"No dice."

Bernard puts his phone back in his bag and asks, "Seriously, Tim, what did you *do*?"

Tim scrubs his face with his hands. The skin around his eyes itches. "I lied," he says.

Bernard nods slowly. "I imagine you're good at that," he says with something a little bruised about his smile. "Must've been a pretty big lie for you to still be grounded."

"It was," Tim agrees.

Bernard raises his eyebrow. "Don't strain yourself or anything, Drake."

Tim *doesn't* grit his teeth, and he *doesn't* clench his fists, and he *doesn't* sound stressed at all when he answers. "Look," he says, almost neutral except for the thin sound of stretched steel, "it's not something I--"

It's not something I want to talk about. But then, that's a lie, too, isn't it? And he's supposed to be *trying*.

Bernard waits.

Tim takes a breath and tries again. "It's not something I *can* talk about." And Bernard looks offended, which-- right, that still wasn't a good answer. "I *can't*," he says again, and hopes there's enough behind the last word to make Bernard understand, because he isn't sure how else to do it.

"I promised," he adds, a little desperately.

Bernard looks oddly serious, and, after a moment, nods. "Okay, then," he says. "Let me know when you're up for coffee. I'll still owe you." He grins, but it's a little hard around the edges. "See you tomorrow, man," he calls, and heads off in the opposite direction.

Tim feels like hitting something repeatedly. A supervillian would be good, his head against a brick wall would be *great*, and if the skin around his eyes doesn't *stop* with the itching pretty damn soon, he's going to look like a raccoon from scratching himself raw.

"Hey, Tim--"

Bernard's leaning up against a telephone pole about thirty feet away, ignoring the mess of chewing gum and fliers sticking to the wood.

"Would you tell me, if you could?"

And that's a question, isn't it. Tim has a feeling there's only one right answer to this, and many many many wrong ones. But the right answer isn't *right*, either, and--

"Yeah," Tim says, and decides he'll have to work on this honesty thing later.

*

The window in his bedroom is still open from the night before, and Tim is well aware that it's not for ventilation purposes.

When Jack Drake came into his son's room at eleven to say goodnight, he looked long and hard at the open window, and long and hard at Tim. Tim didn't say anything except goodnight, and neither of them made a move to shut it.

So it's still open now, almost five hours later, the curtains stirring on faint breezes. Tim is still in his bed, he hasn't heard a motorcycle engine yet, and there shouldn't be any more bed-checks tonight.

This is ten kinds of stupid.

There's temptation, and then there's just *need*, and Tim isn't Batman and he's only willing to take the self-denial thing so far.

It feels like the worst sort of sin and the best kind of freedom to just lean out the window a few inches and *breathe*. The street is barren, the neighbors have all gone to bed, there are sirens in the distance and the light pollution is turning the sky a sickly orange, and it's all Tim can do not to pull on a pair of jeans and just not ever come *back*.

"So, are you coming up, or do I need to come in?" Dick asks from somewhere above Tim's head.

Tim does *not* flinch and hit his head on the window frame. Because he's not out of practice, dammit, and he was *expecting* something like this. Sort of.

"I'll come out," he says, and his voice is marvelously even for four o'clock in the morning. "Deeper shit if you get caught in here than if I get caught out of bed." He balances on the windowsill, grabs the gloved hand Dick offers, and clambers silently up the few feet to the roof.

The roof's asphalt tiles are rough on his bare feet, and warm, and Dick grins at him.

"So," Tim says. "Sitting on my roof every night for the past two weeks is a little creepy."

"Ten days," Dick corrects him.

Tim raises an eyebrow.

"I was on your neighbor's roof the other four." Dick looks maybe a little sheepish, and it makes Tim want to *laugh*-- which freaks him out more than a little, because he wasn't sure if that was something he could still *do*.

Dick must catch a flash of the surprise on his face, because he puts a solid hand on Tim's shoulder and ruffles his hair. "We miss you," he says, like it's something simple. "*I* miss you." Dick isn't embarrassed at all, and Tim. Tim doesn't know how to *do* that, and ducks out from under the weight of his hand.

"You doing all right, kid?" Dick asks, concern coloring his voice, and this time Tim *does* laugh. Quietly, sure, and it feels weird, but he can't help it.

"Jesus, Dick." Tim chuckles mirthlessly. "Yeah, I'm doing *fine*. I don't have a life aside from school, I'm not allowed to talk to anyone from-- whatever--, I can't *lie*, and I can't tell the truth, and my parents check on me every two hours or so to make sure I haven't run off to fight crime in my boxers." He crouches at the edge of the roof, watching his neighbor's cat prowl around the trash cans. "I'm doing just swell."

Dick snorts and settles next to him. "I can see."

"What about you?"

"What about me?" Dick repeats, and Tim hears a lot of-- something, hiding in there.

Tim looks steadily out across the roofs of his neighborhood. "Like I said. Sitting on my roof-- or my neighbor's roof-- for the past two weeks is a little creepy. Flattering," he adds as an afterthought, "but creepy nonetheless."

"Creepy but flattering, that's me," Dick says. "I was worried about you, that's all." He's not looking at Tim, and the lenses on his mask are down anyway.

"And you were going to give me your old Life After Robin handbooks?" Tim asks, and he *is* joking, sort of-- and sort of not. Because who else would even have an idea? But Dick still has a mask, at least, and Tim can't help but sound a little bitter.

"Nah." Dick's ignoring the edge to Tim's voice. "I threw those out. Self-help books don't do jack." They sit quietly on the warm tiles, listening to the city rattle along without them.

"You're not in Bludhaven," Tim says after a few moments.

"No, I'm not." Dick's voice hitches, and it's almost unnoticeable. "Not right now."

"And I'm not Robin anymore."

"Not right now, no."

Tim likes to think that he can read Dick better than Dick can read him, but Dick's arm curls around his shoulders and pulls him in, so apparently he's not so difficult to figure out after all. Dick is warm and solid and slightly damp with sweat, and his hand is tracing circles on Tim's shoulder through his t-shirt. Tim feels suddenly, bone-achingly tired.

"This *sucks*," he hears himself mumble, and all he wants to do is burrow into Dick's side and sleep for days.

Dick's hand has moved up his neck to tangle in his hair. "We'll figure something out, okay?" he hears Dick say, and his breath is tickling his ear. "Get you back in the uniform where you belong, and everything back the way it should be--"

And that sounds *great*, it sounds perfect-- and completely, completely wrong.

Tim shakes his head and pulls back a little. "No," he says, and Dick looks confused. "It won't go *back*, Dick. I can't--" God, he really wants to hit something, someone-- but not Dick, not Dick, because it's not *his* fault things change.

Tim takes a breath. "I don't think I'd be-- *Steph's* Robin, now, and things--" He really doesn't know how to finish this.

"You're just not Robin anymore." Dick nods, like it makes sense, and maybe it does-- if you're in Gotham and sitting on a rooftop and it's almost four-thirty and you aren't Robin anymore. His hand is on Tim's back, rubbing between his shoulder blades, and Tim risks leaning into the touch a little more.

"I still want a mask, though," Tim says, and he can feel Dick's grin without looking at him.

"Not a bike?" he asks, standing up and offering Tim a hand.

"Well, that too," Tim admits as he brushes the grit of the roof off his boxers. "And I wouldn't mind a cape. I liked the cape."

"The cape *was* pretty cool," Dick agrees. "Yours was much better than mine." He looks at Tim for a long minute, and Tim tries to read him under the mask without much success.

"We *will* figure something out, you know," Dick says, and it's almost a threat. To whom, Tim isn't sure. "If not Robin, then *something*, okay?" He lifts his hand to Tim's face, and Tim just-- freezes, and Dick's thumb brushes his cheek as his other hand settles on Tim's arm. "Okay?" Dick asks, and this isn't about Robin, this isn't about Robin at *all*.

It's dry and soft, almost not a kiss at all, but it's enough to make Tim feel like he's about to go flying off the rails blindfolded, or at the very least fall off the roof.

"Okay?" Dick asks, and Tim nods. This is very okay.

**Author's Note:**

> _The title and the summary come from this gorgeous poem by Larissa Szporluk:_
> 
> **Deer Crossing the Sea**
> 
> Many things were like sleep,  
> wholly in the power of the forest,  
> the deep middle, deep shiver, deep shade,  
> from which many things ran, unawake,  
> in search of new mountains to graze,  
> covered in flowers, _my love, I am sick_,  
> or covered in snow, pink with algae,  
> in search of impossible light  
> made of water, whose sapphire waves  
> swathed their heads, _you were only a dream_,  
> as they swam out to meet it, kicking their hooves,  
> no longer breathing, because no one  
> or nothing can quit once the body gets wind  
> of an eden-- the promise of nectar  
> haunts them forever, the shore pecked out  
> of their eyes, and there, in its stead,  
> something greater to catch,  
> a scent that would paralyze God.


End file.
